"Molly's Game" is a film that tells the true story of Molly Bloom, an Olympic-class skier who, after a career-ending injury, ended up running one of the most exclusive underground poker games in the world. The games start in LA and finish in New York when the lifestyle catches up with Molly.
The movie centers around this mythical high-stakes game, in a lavish apartment somewhere where the buy-ins are sometimes $250,000. From the cover and trailer, it’s hard to say if Molly’s Game is going to be realistic. Will the games be true to poker norms or take the Hollywood route, where every hand is a cooler and straight flushes seem to come hourly?
Poker players will be pleased to know that Molly’s Game nailed a few things.
Here are 5 things Molly's Game got right about poker.
1. Players Tilting
Throughout Molly’s Game, players are tilting. Some do the Phil Hellmuth walk-off, while some launch food at the dealer. These blowups can get a bit exaggerated, but the movie also shows the more lasting effects of tilt.
A loss in one pivotal moment broke one of the most seasoned players, which sent him on a losing streak. “I just have to get back to even”, he claimed.
Indeed, tilt isn’t always anger or annoyance.
Sometimes, the feelings of loss take us further from strategic thinking. “Just getting back to even” is the goal, but that’s not a strategy. We can be so desperate to get out of the hole that we focus on that, instead of putting that brainpower towards adjustments.
Understand the game to understand the outcomes. It's harder to be tilted when you understand why you lost the hand.
Tilt affects online players just as much, but you can fight those feelings.
- Play on a poker site that has high traffic, not empty tables.
- Get rewarded for being there, with loyalty programs and deposit bonuses.
- Play at the right stakes and not above your comfort level.
2. Staking, Loans, and Vouching
Molly Game shows staking throughout the movie, from different angles. Michael Cera’s character, Player X, stakes one of his opponents. Can you see the problem with staking a player who sits across from you? It opens the game up for collusion, as Molly points out.
Throughout the movie, players at the high-stakes games loan and vouch for each other. To even sit at such an exclusive table, players vouch for each other if they don’t know Molly already. Then, this opens up lines of credit for whoever doesn’t pay up-front. We get to see when this goes well and when it fails.
But, in reality, someone's word isn’t always as solid as we’d hope. In the movie, one player racks up $1.2 million in losses from a single session, and then says, “I don’t have it”.
The real high-stakes community has seen this happen too many times to count. Plenty of big names are allegedly behind on debt payments, like Tom Dwan, who’s been called out by several players recently. Even seasoned veterans make bad loans. There was Patrik Antonius, who gave $700,000 to a tech entrepreneur and never saw a dime in return. Daniel Negreanu claims to be owed almost eight figures. Countless pros tell a similar tale. Plenty of them are stuck in payment plans with debtors that may never send a dollar more. The sums are large, but it seems to keep happening.
Molly’s Game portrayed this aspect of high-stakes poker quite well.
3. Reg vs Fish Confusion
A misunderstanding often happens between regulars and complete beginners. There’s a scene in Molly’s Game that explains this to the audience and shows one of the consequences.
A character named Harlan is the reg in this clip. With , he has a boat on the turn.
It’s a heads-up pot, and when a comes on the river, the reg goes for a little more value. However, the final bet doesn’t get called, because Bad Brad shoves. Yes, that’s really his name in the movie.
Harlan has never played with Bad Brad before, so he doesn’t know how awful this man is at poker. The movie tells us Brad was representing with his preflop action, which means he could have made top full house on the river.
Harlan lays down the boat, but eventually finds out Brad was playing the board.
Tilt = activated.
This is the “reg vs fish” issue that poker players face online and offline. If you have a solid strategy, how does it perform against a player who doesn’t employ much strategy? It can be destabilizing unless we adapt to the new situation. Hand2Note is one tool that can detect regulars and fish, so that you don’t make a blunder like Harlan.
4. Players Imagining the Game is Rigged
"It wasn't luck or skill that lost me the hand, this game is rigged!"
There will always be a small group of players who imagine that the game is rigged against them. Sometimes, like in the case of Mike Postle and Stones Gambling Hall, it seems like such accusations have merit. Other times, a player gets a bad beat and can’t see past the rage. Perhaps it's a comforting idea for some and a way of rationalizing the loss.
In Molly’s Game, they show this happening more than once. Both times, the characters lose a big hand, and go on tilt.
Tilted players and bad beats are two ingredients that always seem to precede a “this game is rigged” accusation. To be fair, they aren’t playing inside regulated casinos in Molly’s Game, so rigged games are more likely.
This happened recently on the Hustler Casino Live stream, when a player had their Aces cracked. By the end, even a strip search was discussed.
Fan-favorite Garrett Adelstein made a similar accusation in the same casino, but that was never resolved.
5. Laws of Underground Games
One of the reasons that Molly can run her underground game for so long is the rake. She wasn't At her games, she made money through tips – never from a table commission. That, is apparently what made her game legal.
This all changes one day when she realizes her exposure is too risky. To cover herself financially, she begins to take a rake from the game.
You might not know it, but many US states allow you to operate poker games, as long as:
- You aren’t taking a rake.
- You aren’t taking any other fees, like charging players for seats or table time.
- You aren’t serving alcohol.
- You aren’t in a commercial setting.
Now, these are general rules of thumb, but each area might have different laws or policies.
